Jeff Jarvis points out that "taking the pledge" offered by O'Reilly has some interesting risks:

So imagine the challenge to Section 230 . . . . A lawyer says to a blogger in the witness box: ‘You put that badge on your site saying that you are responsible for everything on that site and you do kill comments that violate your code, which assures that no one will be libeled or defamed, and yet you left up this comment (wave printout menacingly) that defamed my good client.’ If I were that attorney, I would say that you waived the protection of Section 230. That would be dumb. And dangerous.

I allow annonymous comments here, and the only real policing I do is to get rid of spam and bad language - some people flame me for the latter, but hey - my site, my rules. I hadn't really considered Jarvis' point, but it looks like the code of conduct movement could end up biting back in ways O'Reilly hasn't considered.

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